Battlefield Medicine
by MarcusJuniusBrutus
Summary: The Battle of New York and its aftermath from the perspective of Dr. Stephen Strange. Kind of short, and there will be cameos. Rated for battle violence.
1. Battle

Time is a funny thing, isn't it? While Einstein and a host of other scientists and philosophers maintain that time is relative from a scientific point of view, your average human generally scoffs at these learned gentlemen and says, "I could've told you that." Time speeds up when you're having fun. It slows down when you're doing something hard. Everybody knows that.

Stephen Strange always felt like time stood still for him when he was in surgery. When he got into his zone, it was just him and the body on the table and anything that helped him solve his latest medical problem. Nothing else mattered. Nothing outside that room.

He hated when people reminded him that he was fighting the clock, that there was a life on the line. They didn't _need_ to remind him, anyway. He was the fastest surgeon in the hospital, besides being the smartest and most capable. Most arrogant, too. He'd own up to that when his coworkers accused him of it, but always with an indifferent shrug. Putting up with his attitude was, in the end, a small price to pay for utilizing his skills and his name. Both served Metro-General very well, so in the end, even the most exasperated had to leave Doctor Strange alone.

They left him to his surgeries – to his own private bubble where he'd work for hours, often in intense concentration, and emerge to suddenly realize that he was tired or hungry. His assistants were part of that bubble. So was his music. So were his tools. As far as he was concerned, nothing else existed.

Which was why it was especially jarring when an explosion rocked the world outside and echoed into the hospital, rupturing Stephen's illusion. If it had happened a few seconds later, he realized, his forceps hovering over the small hole he'd made in his patient's skull, something more significant may have ruptured. He flinched at that sound, like everyone else in the room and quickly chided himself for it.

Two more explosions followed, and Stephen steadied his hand. _That's the last time I flinch today_, he told himself, taking a breath to slow the flutter in his heart. Everyone else in the room was looking at him, when they weren't looking around at the pale green walls and the operating theater windows, as though those would offer some helpful clues.

"Nurse Jenkins," Strange said, forceps still over the hole, "go find out what's happening. The rest of us will finish up here."

_Finish up? _He could read the question in their faces, even if none dared speak it out loud. There was disbelief in several pairs of eyes, both that the fact that they were expected to carry on as though nothing out of the ordinary was happening, and at the calm that Strange managed to infuse into his voice.

As Georgia Jenkins speed-walked out of the room, tearing the mask from her face even before she'd reached the door, the others rotated slowly into position.

"Well, this aneurysm isn't going to clip itself," he joked. It was probably the least original crack he'd ever fired off during surgery, but it got a small, desperate chuckle. Stephen flicked his eyes around the room at a cluster of doctors and nurses who, despite their best intentions, were hardly at their most professional. He tried again to rally his troops, this time simply saying, "We've got this."

Say what you will about arrogance, but when Strange said those words with that confidence, every person in that room believed him. Doctor Stephen Strange had never failed to deliver. They wouldn't think of contradicting him. So with those words, they settled back into their usual rhythm.

Stephen, with more of that partly-justified arrogance, assumed that would be their reaction, and he returned to the task at hand without sparing them another thought. As he gently opened a corridor between the brain and the skull, part of his mind heard more explosions, crashes, and screams all around the hospital, but he didn't so much as twitch again. There wasn't a single tremor in his hand, though he did pick up the pace when Nurse Jenkins burst back into the operating room and announced,

"Aliens are invading the city."

"Aliens?" Strange repeated incredulously even as that same one-word refrain rippled in a murmur through the staff. Jenkins shrugged helplessly and nodded. Did Strange believe in aliens? Maybe. There were lots of weird things happening lately around the world. But aliens or not, it was clear that a lot of people were going to get hurt, and a lot were going to die. "Okay," he said, mind buzzing through his options as he spoke, "get down to the ER, and take anyone else who isn't needed here. That would be you three and you." He gestured at the chosen. "The rest of us will finish up here and then join you."

While he didn't normally descend to the ER, he figured this would be an all-hands-on-deck situation, so he was prepared to make an exception. He didn't know if they'd be preparing for triage, evacuation, or both, but they'd need all the help they could get. In his own mind, Stephen determined that he personally wasn't evacuating anywhere until after he'd finished this surgery, but fortunately, he didn't have to make that choice.

No one interfered as he worked. No one told him to hurry up. He was welcomed gladly when he emerged and had an abbreviated medical chart shoved into his hands. "Your first patient. Some sort of head trauma. He was hit with a filing cabinet when the Hulk rampaged through his office."

"The… Hulk?" Strange asked, slightly dazed again.

"Big green guy who was tearing up Harlem a while back."

"I know who he is," Strange snapped. "Is he the one causing all of this?" The spread of bleeding bodies, sprawling in chairs and on stretchers in seemingly every visible inch of waiting room space, seemed even more exaggerated than it had before. He pointed at a nearby woman who was silently sobbing while holding a wad of paper towels against a black mark on her face. The paper towels had fused themselves there and were mostly deteriorated, but she didn't notice or care. "The Hulk made those burns?" Strange asked.

"No, no. He and Tony Stark and some other people are fighting the aliens."

Strange huffed and checked the chart, which sent him nearly to the other side of the hospital. "Fine. Just leave me in a room and keep sending them my way."

"Done."

Stephen's long legs carried him at a half-jog through the familiar halls. There was no running in hospitals, but adrenaline and necessity pushed him forward. He knew why they'd sent him so far from the entrance: They were sending him the patients who could be moved that far. The ones who stood a chance of surviving. They weren't going to waste their best and brightest on the ones who were practically DOA. Those were going to die at the door and get wheeled away as soon as the orderlies could spare the time.

"Two hours, fourteen minutes!" Strange heard the words called at his back in an impressed afterthought. That must've been how long he'd spent on the aneurysm. As usual, he hadn't been tracking the passage of time in the moment, though he should've been proud of that time once he was out. He did remember estimating that the surgery was supposed to take about three and a half hours.

_Of course_, he thought with a resentful twinge, _I could've done it faster if I'd known from the _beginning_ that I'd have to hurry_. When he thought of all the time he's spent on the craniotomy, carefully removing that bone flap… He shook his head to clear those thoughts as more immediate concerns moved to the foreground.

It was at that point he realized that he was powering down a corridor along the outer wall of the building. This particular corridor was lined with giant-paned windows that offered staff, patients, and visitors a fair amount of sunlight, if nothing else. Usually the view, which was largely of the hospital parking lot, went under-appreciated by the people who were just trying to get from one place to another. Today, a line of people pressed their faces to the window and stared at distant flashes in the sky above.

"Are those…" Strange started to ask, but then he realized he didn't know who he was asking, and stopped. _Aliens_, his brain finished for him. _Those are aliens._

Human nature and his own irrepressible curiosity slowed his steps just long enough for him to shoulder his way into the line and gape up at the sky.

Two seconds later, the shock wave of an explosion sent him hurtling back into the wall behind him. A flash of light and a shower of glass joined the force that flung him away. He didn't even have enough time to utter a stunned gasp; he choked on it as he hit the wall.

Ears ringing and back aching, he pushed off the wall and staggered to his feet as soon as possible. At first, his only thought was to get away as soon as possible, but when he rubbed at his eyes and surveyed the damage in the hallway, that thought fled from his mind.

"Move!" he yelled at the nearest people, or to all of them in general. He began hauling the least-injured up and shoving them down the hallway if they refused to start on their own.

The explosion, he saw, hadn't been directly in front of him. He'd only caught the edge of it, but there was a hole in the middle of the hallway window and a sizeable chunk of the floor. Mangled bodies lay twisted below and off to the sides. Some lay still. Some wept.

Had it been a bomb? An alien bomb? Stephen couldn't say for sure, but he could see the rapid fire of lasers streaking back and forth across the sky outside. In other words: the threat was still close by, and it seemed to be coming closer.

People were starting to move of their own accord now, fleeing to whichever side of the hallway was closer, but not everyone could. He spotted one medical student on the ground, clutching at her leg just above a large embedded shard of glass. If not for the imminent danger, Strange would've fashioned a tourniquet to help control the bleeding long enough to get her to safety.

He was even opening his mouth to tell her she was going to be okay when a grey blur hurtling at the window made him alter his plans at the last second. "Keep still," he told the girl, "and I'm sorry about this."

With the few seconds he had before the figure arrived, he hauled one of the dead bodies onto the girl's upper half. If should could play dead herself, she might be safe. She seemed to catch on, as far as Strange could tell from her strangled whimper, before the figure arrived.

It was an alien who swung through the hole in the window from a vessel that looked like a flying jet ski. The jet ski, which had another grey alien on it, flew away to cause more harm elsewhere. The alien now standing in Metro-General Hospital wheeled around wildly to mark his territory with a roar.

He unslung a long weapon from his back and began spraying laser fire all around as Stephen hit the deck and covered his head with his hands. Nothing hit him, though a fresh wave of burned-flesh smell told him that one laser had struck the human shield he'd placed over the med student. (_Formerly-human shield_, he reminded himself.)

The firing slowed from the initial burst to slow, methodical shots, and Stephen risked a look up. The alien was facing the other way, shooting down a fleeing couple in street clothes. This was his chance to do something. To attack it? To run? He needed to make up his mind fast, because if he didn't, he doubted he'd survive another minute in this hallway. Either way, he had to get up. Now.

He'd only risen as far as his knees when the alien wheeled around and locked eyes with the doctor. Stephen froze in place, for once in his life not sure what to do next. The alien could see it, too, and he sneered as he aimed his weapon.

Stephen knew he didn't have any options left – that there was nothing he could do – and, somehow, that thought almost seemed worse than dying. He didn't want to be trapped. He didn't want to be helpless. He didn't want to die because there was "nothing he could do." That fear and resentment that flooded through him as he stared into those pale eyes – thin slits in a hard and twisted face – was almost the last thing he felt or thought.

Instead, a flash of light blasted through the open window and hit the alien in the head. Soon there wasn't a head there, and Stephen felt something warm and sticky rain down on his own face.

The headless alien body crumpled to its knees and then to the floor as outside the window, Iron Man lowered the hand that had just killed the creature. The billionaire in the metal war suit hovered in the air, powered by small jets coming out of his feet and his other hand, as he took in the scene before him and then jetted away as soon as he'd determined that there were no more targets.

The fight soon drifted away from the hospital, largely thanks to Tony Stark's intervention, and help flooded the hallway to aid the injured.

Stephen shakily extracted himself from all offers of help and headed for the nearest shower. He was disoriented, staggering, and covered in black goo. It was no surprise that he got double-takes and more offers of help as he continued on his way. "I'm fine," he barked at anyone who got too close. Almost anyone.

When he heard Dr. Christine Palmer gasp, "Stephen!" as she ran towards him, he said it in a softer tone.

"I'm fine," he reassured her, holding his hands up and backing away as she got close. She looked relatively clean at this point. (At least, she wasn't covered in alien… blood? Brain matter?) He didn't want her touching him and needing to wash up herself.

She got the message and backed away, though one hand unconsciously drifted up towards him before she forced herself to pull it back. "You're sure?"

"Sure." He gave a firm nod as he said this. In fact, his head was starting to clear post-explosion, and he was walking straighter. He didn't know whether he was running on adrenaline, whether the situation hadn't sunk in yet, or he was as detached from reality as some people accused him of being, but it was the truth. He wasn't injured, and his head was starting to clear.

In fact, it was clearing enough for him to give his co-worker a thoughtful look. He'd asked Christine out a week before, and she'd laughed in his face before citing his track record with other hospital staff. Evidently, she thought his turnover rate was higher than it ought to be. She also thought he had too high an opinion of himself. Now, though, she was seeing a coworker looking wounded and vulnerable.

She went in for that sort of thing, didn't she? Stephen was smart enough not to ask her out again on the spot, but he'd certainly bank those sympathy points and use them at a more opportune time. To his small credit, he felt a little guilty that his thoughts were drifting in this direction while people's lives were on the line, but he decided it was partly adrenaline and the uncertainty of the day.

For the moment, he only said, "I was supposed to be in surgery…"

"It's okay. Nick covered." Strange snorted, but Christine pressed on, "Don't worry. There'll be more for you as soon as you're ready. If you're really up to it."

"I won't be long." He gave her a quick nod and a martyred half-smile before beating his retreat. When he finally reached the showers, though, he caught a glimpse of his reflection in the mirror and said "Yikes. Forget Christine. _I'd _feel sorry for me." Besides the black goop, he had to clean up a few other scratches, possibly from glass shards. More of these were sprinkled in the dark waves of his hair, which had been greying at the temples ever since med school but had never before glittered.

He removed them all as carefully as possible, scoured every inch of his body with a rough sponge in hot water, bandaged his cuts, and dressed in clean scrubs. "Okay," he told himself, checking out his reflection again, "back into the fray."


	2. Aftermath

When he heard that he could finally go home, Stephen's brain was too overloaded to fully process the news. He'd been at the hospital for five straight days, and while there was some catnapping whenever he could grab a few hours here and there, he was operating on the never-ending stream of victims in a condition that would've been considered unwise and unsafe if it hadn't just been a war zone. As it was, he operated on auto-pilot, cutting and stitching with rote movements that teetered on the point where he thought he'd be making mistakes soon.

The words "Okay, Stephen, go home and rest up" were almost foreign to him at that point, but he propelled his aching body out of the chief of medicine's office and toward his car without any additional urging. Other doctors had come and gone. Now it was his turn, and the rest would be well-earned. He knew he'd be expected back in the morning, or as soon as traffic would let him back, but for now…

Oh. Traffic.

Stephen was halfway to the parking garage when his clouded mind registered the fact that a battle had raged around the hospital, and that he might not be able to take his usual route. He detoured to the nearest nurses' station; nurses always had their fingers on the pulse of information. "Nurse Temple," he hailed the first one he saw.

Claire Temple, a smart, efficient nurse who now sported dark circles beneath her eyes, glanced up from the computer and winced over-dramatically when she saw the approaching doctor. "Here comes the walking dead," she said before swilling down some strong-smelling coffee.

"What's it like out there?" he asked, and when he got two incredulously-raised eyebrows in reply, he clarified, "They're finally letting me out for a bit. Do you know what roads are clear?" His eyes drifted to a television at the nurse's station that had the sound turned down but was still showing the news, which was still all about the Battle of New York, the bravery of local heroes and a band of more powerful superheroes, and the ongoing cleanup efforts. On screen right now, a caravan of trucks labeled Damage Control shuttled debris away from a fallen building. This wasn't what Stephen was looking for, so he forced himself to focus on Nurse Temple's words.

"…half of Manhattan is still shut down," she was saying. "Don't try to drive anywhere south of here."

"But that's where my apartment is." The words slipped out with an edge of desperation, and while he normally despised anyone who looked so weak, he couldn't help it.

"We still have beds here."

"Only if I want to be drafted again. I can't operate like this. I can't… I can hardly move." He could barely think, either, but maybe that was a blessing. He didn't want to relieve the invasion or aftermath, at least not yet. He knew it would come, and his photographic memory would recall every excruciating detail and every face twisted in pain and every second that he saved one life at the expense of ten or twenty others who needed surgery just as badly.

The nurse in front of him offered a smile that was not unsympathetic, but it was accompanied by a shrug that clearly conveyed that she had other priorities right now. She did offer one last suggestion as he pulled away, saying, "You could always sleep in that fancy car of yours." After Stephen turned his back, he heard Claire Temple get back to work and address an approaching patient. "Mr. Meachum, the doctors say that you can go home. The wound to your hand wasn't serious enough to warrant hospitalization."

"I cut it on some alien ship thing!" he yelled back. "What if it's infected?"

"You can always come back if you start showing symptoms, but we just don't have the room right now."

"Okay, well, at least give me some stronger pain meds. This hurts like a…"

"There aren't any doctors available to see you right now," Temple countered.

"What about him? What's he doing right now?"

Assuming this Meachum guy was talking about him, Stephen slipped into an elevator just before it shut its doors and breathed a sigh of relief as it began to descend along with its payload. The floor he wanted was blocked off thanks to battle damage, so he got off at the floor above and walked through a makeshift area that was set up to accept blood donations. People always flocked in to give blood during tragedies, though year-round would've been more helpful, but in this case, Stephen wouldn't complain. He suspected not much of it would go to waste like it sometimes did when there was an influx.

Instead, he silently passed through the corridor with the row of donor chairs that were slightly less partitioned than normal, thanks to the hurried setup. Part of him tried to solve his bed problem and part of him listened to snatches of conversation from those around him.

"It's okay, Foggy. You're doing fine." This was from one donor to another as they sat in chairs close to each other.

"Heh. You wouldn't say that if you saw how pale I looked. Are you sure they know how much blood is safe to take from a person?"

Then a little after that, a man in a suit was saying to a woman giving blood, "We should take some pictures of you here for your Instagram and the Trish Talk website."

"Don't you think that would be a little crass?" she replied.

Yes. Yes, it would be. But Stephen didn't judge. Instead, he kept listening until he heard someone speaking to him. "Doc! Hey, Doc!" It was one of the residents, who was always looking to score a few points. How did he still look chipper? Had he been getting enough sleep? Stephen resented him for it. "You heading out? Word is that the roads to Queens are open right now."

"Queens?" Stephen repeated incredulously. "I don't need to go to Queens."

As soon as he snapped out the words with an ungrateful glare, the resident went skittering backwards with his hands raised defensively. "Sorry, sorry. That's just what they're tellin' me."

Stephen stalked away, mentally scrolling through his contact list. Who did he knew that lived in Queens and would take him in for a night? He'd burned a lot of bridges, but people might be generous and understanding under the circumstances. Unfortunately, most of his colleagues and exes lived in Manhattan, except for a few that were still here on duty. At last, he hit on a potential name.

Everett Ross, who'd been his roommate one year in his college undergrad days, had some sort of government job that kept him roaming the globe, but was currently stationed in New York City. They'd gotten together once for drinks before realizing they had nothing in common anymore, but in that time, Everett mentioned that he had an apartment in Queens. Of course, he probably wasn't there any more, but it was worth a shot.

He plucked the phone number from his mental rolodex and then called up his old friend. He was pleasantly surprised to get an answer right away. "Hey, Evie, it's Stephen!" He tried to sound as casual as possible. He remembered calling Everett "Evie" sometimes when they were tipsy then cringed when he remembered how much Everett hated it when they were sober. Not a great start, but he plunged ahead. "I've been run off my feet at the hospital and I desperately need a place to crash. Can I stay at your apartment tonight?"

"Of course. Of course you can." The voice was warm and generous as always and held no trace of resentment for the months of silence between them. "I'm not there now, but I'll have someone let you in."

"You are a lifesaver. Thank you." He didn't thank people much these days, but genuine gratitude poured through every fiber of his being.

"No problem. Look, I have to run, but we'll catch up later, yeah?"

"Sure."

They hung up, and Stephen continued his trek with a lighter heart. He was stopped one more time, just outside the stairwell, when a nurse called out, "You know you can't get to your apartment, right?"

"I know; I'm headed to Queens."

She waived and continued on her way, but a nearby man interposed before Stephen could do likewise. "Excuse me, Doctor, I'm sorry, but could I catch a ride with you? I live in Queens, but I got stuck out here during the battle. I wasn't hurt badly, but the buses aren't going on a regular schedule, and I…"

"Can you drive?" he asked, eying the man judgmentally. What he saw was a dark-haired man in his early middle age with weathered skin and workman's clothes that were rough but passably clean.

The man's eyes widened in surprise. "Yeah, I can drive."

Stephen's first thought had been to laugh this guy away, but he realized the man could have some use. "You can come if you drive, and if you do it without scratching the car. I'm going to sleep in the passenger's seat, so you drive to… wherever you're going in Queens, and you can wake me when we get there. Okay?"

"Of course! Thank you! My name's Ben Parker, by the way."

He stuck out his hand, and Stephen shook it out of societal obligation, though he wasn't interested in the man at all. "Wonderful. Come on."

They trotted down to the garage where Stephen made for his Lamborghini. For half a second, he found himself looking for his old Porsche, but then he remembered that he'd had to replace it recently. For some reason, an ex decided to take a crowbar to it.

He missed that car, though his new toy excited him, too. He slid into the immaculate seats that he knew would need thorough cleaning after today, between him and his passenger. He passed over the keys with a twinge of apprehension as the man said, "You have no idea how much this means to me. My wife and nephew have been worried sick. They know I'm okay, but until I actually make it home…"

"We don't have to talk."

"Right. You must be tired. I'll let you sleep."

The word 'sleep' was all it took. Stephen closed his eyes and immediately succumbed to a dreamless and unsatisfying sleep. He woke all too soon to a gentle tap on his shoulder. His first fleeting thought was that it might've been unwise to trust a stranger with his keys and his car, not to mention his own unconscious body, but it seemed okay. They'd pulled up in a run-down neighborhood where his Lamborghini was decidedly out of place but would be leaving soon.

"We're here. Sorry, but the drive took a few hours. Traffic was backed up like you wouldn't believe."

"I believe," Stephen responded, rubbing out a kink in his neck. "And I needed the sleep." He checked his watch out of habit, not that he knew what time he'd left the hospital, but he liked showing off whatever timepiece he happened to be wearing. In this case, it was a $4,000 Monaco.

Ben Parker regarded him with soft, concerned eyes. "Are you okay to drive the rest of the way?"

"I'll be fine."

"You could crash on my couch here. It's the least I can do."

It really was the least, judging by the state of this dump. Oh, a glance told him that the building was well-maintained, but he could hardly expect any comforts here. Out loud, he said, "My friend's expecting me."

"Of course. Thanks again."

"Not a problem." They both exited the vehicle so that Strange could circle around to the driver's side and Parker could make for the front door. Stephen glanced into the rearview mirror once as he drove away, just in time to see a woman barreling out of the house to clutch Ben Parker in a tight embrace and land a desperate kiss that he returned with equal fervor. _Good for him_, Stephen thought sincerely before putting the incident entirely out of his mind.

Sometimes, a part of him envied that kind of honest, reciprocal love that some people shared, but right now, he was in pursuit of something more valuable than love. Right now, he was going to get a good night's sleep.


End file.
